2 Juarez police officers dead, 3 injured in weekend attack

Two Juarez police officers were shot to death and three more survived an attack during a violent weekend in Juarez that targeted peace officers.

As a result of those attacks, the municipal police force will be sequestered "as long as it will be necessary," authorities said Monday.

"We are going to sequester the officers as we did it before," said Juárez Mayor Héctor Murguía. "They will be sequestered at the federal police headquarters."

The string of violence against city police officers started Friday morning when a police convoy was ambushed by an armed command at the intersection of Montes Urales Avenue and the Oscar Flores Boulevard.

Three officers were injured during the attack. One of them remains in serious condition in a local hospital. The other two were released from the hospital the same day with no threatening life injuries.

A second attack on police officers occurred Saturday morning when an officer was killed while still in his pajamas outside of his house at La Chaveña neighborhood in downtown. That same day in the evening, another officer was shot while watching over a convenience store at the Anahuac neighborhood.

Murguía said the attacks against the officers was a result of the actions taken by the municipal police to fight organized crime and he refused the idea that the violence is resurging in the city.

"The police corporations are working together to reduce the number of crimes in the city", he said in a press release. "We have a strong and qualified police force.

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This is the second time that the police force gets sequestered. In January this year, the officers were confined to hotels after a string of violence left more than eight officers killed in just that month.

Adrián Sánchez Contreras, spokeman of the municipal police, said the sequestration process will start today. He said the officers will continue patrolling the streets, but they won't go to home after their shift.

"They will work like normal," he said. "But they can't go home. This is for their safety".